March 2011
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February 2011
2 posts
January 2011
3 posts
ASB :: Cover Archive →
Only the ‘Time Flies’ chronological section is fully updated. There are well over 1,000 covers in the archive. I keep adding to the collection, but can only ever represent a fraction of what’s out there.
This archive is about graphic design. I’ve attempted to label each cover with a date and, where possible, a designer (or design firm). The designs are the...
December 2010
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September 2010
2 posts
The Art and Craft of Printing
Though William Morris’ attempts to go back to the early days of printing to create the “ideal book” did not bear many fruits, anyone interested in typography, printing or Arts & Craft movement will surely enjoy the few essays collected in The Art and Craft of Printing. If I had to sum up Morris’ contribution to typography, I would say that he had actually identified the flaws of...
August 2010
8 posts
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Applied design for printers
“This primer of design is an earnest effort to make intelligible to the apprentice student certain fundamental principles of arrangement and of ornamentation whose use is instinctive to the accomplished typographer.”
—Harry L. Gage, Applied Design for Printers, a handbook of the principles of arrangement, with brief comments on the periods of design which have most strongly influenced...
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A Book of Scripts
A Book of Scripts, by Alfred Fairbank, a King Penguin book.
Cover designed and hand-drawn by Jan Tschichold, based on a page in Arte Subtilissima intitulada Orthographia Pratica, a classic work on calligraphy and engraving by the 16th century Spanish writing master, Juan de Yçiar (1515-90).
The National Book League recognized this title as one of the best-designed books of 1949.
Source:...
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The Long and the Short of the Letter S →
“As my previous post on long-s left much unsaid about the origins of the long-s, which should perhaps have preceded any discussion of its rules of usage, I shall endeavour to give a brief, illustrated history of the letter “s”, culminating with my take on the eszett issue. Western paleography isn’t my area of expertise (although I do profess a certain dilettantish interest), so I...
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History of the Book →
“On this site we present typographical material of different countries - most of it from the Netherlands for the period 1470-1800 and France 16th century printers.
Pictures are made in close cooperation with Special Collections, Amsterdam, also with the Royal Library, The Hague and the Archive at Alkmaar. This project was made possible with the help of the Huizinga Instituut, University of...
Pannartz & Sweynheim
The first roman type ever used by printers (on Flickr).
Arnold Pannartz and Konrad Sweinheim were two printers of the fifteenth century.
Pannartz died about 1476, Sweinheim in 1477. Pannartz was, perhaps, a native of Prague, and Sweinheim of Eltville near Mainz. Zedler believes (Gutenberg-Forschungen, 1901) that Sweinheim worked at Eltville with Gutenberg in 1461-64. Whether Pannartz had been...
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Notes on G. J. Göschen
In 1785, Georg Joachim Göschen (1752-1828) founded the J. Göschen’s Publishing Company in Leipzig. Göschen made a name for himself as the publisher of the German classics: In 1793, he published the first edition of Christoph Martin Wieland’s Collected Works, and in the years 1787-90, he published the first collection of writings by Goethe. Göschen entertained a close friendship with Schiller,...
The Measure of Type →
“Agates. Ciceros. Nuts. Even people who use type every day may not know these weird and obscure measuring terms for the job of setting type. But once you understand them, you can tap into their power to make your work better and easier.”
July 2010
14 posts
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“Architects, painters, sculptors, we must all return to crafts! For there is no such thing as ‘professional art’. There is no essential difference between the artist and the craftsman. The artist is an exalted craftsman. By the grace of Heaven and in rare moments of inspiration which transcend the will, art may unconsciously blossom from the labour of his hand, but a base in handicrafts is...
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Herbert Bayer
Herbert Bayer (1900–1985), Austrian graphic designer, painter, photographer, sculptor, art director, environmental & interior designer and architect, was widely recognized as the last living member of the Bauhaus and was instrumental in the development of the Atlantic Richfield Company’s corporate art collection until his death in 1985.
Typography-related work
Bayer apprenticed under...
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